Forbidden Song

Nina Simone was one of the most gifted vocalists of her generation, and also one of the most eclectic. Simone was a singer, pianist, and songwriter who bent genres to her will rather than allowing herself to be confined by their boundaries; her work swung back and forth between jazz, blues, soul, classical, R&B, pop, gospel, and world music, with passion, emotional honesty, and a strong grasp of technique as the constants of her musical career.

Restrained, passionate, and absolutely beautiful.
"Forbidden Colours" is a 1983 song by David Sylvian and Ryuichi Sakamoto. The song is the vocal version of the theme from the Nagisa Oshima film Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence. It appears on the film's soundtrack album and was released as a single on Virgin Records in 1983 (the second collaborative single release by Sylvian and Sakamoto, following 1982's "Bamboo Houses").

Temptation, prohibition, good, evil… ‘how relevant are these in today's world?’ asks Benjamin Appl. With the complicity of pianist James Baillieu, we are taken on a musical arc from simple folk songs through to the great song composers such as Schubert, Schumann and Wolf, along the way visiting the French masters Debussy and Poulenc, exploring ‘new objectivity’ with Weill and Eisler and enjoying compositions by Casucci, Heggie and others. The metaphor of forbidden fruit gives Benjamin and James a wide range of possible interpretations. Whilst some of the song settings centre on sensuality, others focus on socially immoral topics such as incest or sensitive subjects such as abortion. The German baritone embodies each of these stories with a passion and dramatic sense that makes this album a kaleidoscopic and astonishing journey through time and space.